Erdogan Is Now Running His Own Deep State: «Ergenekon II»

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan came to power as prime minister in 2002 when his Justice and Development Party (AKP) was elected in a democratic election. At the start of the AKP’s rule in Turkey, Erdogan and large sectors of business, politics, academia, the media, and the moderate Islamic religious movement led by charismatic cleric Fethullah Gulen were all on the same page concerning the presence of a «deep state» in Turkey. This deep state had fomented three past military coups. The Turkish deep state, composed of nationalistic military and intelligence officials, was also known as «Ergenekon».

Erdogan was generally applauded by many Turks when he decided to go on the offensive against Ergenekon, rooting out many of its key players and sacking them from the military and Turkey’s intelligence service, the MIT. But Erdogan did not stop with the military and MIT in finding Ergenekon conspirators. Increasingly becoming paranoid about secret plots against him and his government, Erdogan began accusing all of his political opponents of being Ergenekon cabalists. The increasingly Islamist AKP government began charging journalists, Kurds, Armenians, academics, non-Ergenekon members of the military, members of the Constitutional Court, and leaders of the opposition parties with being part of Ergenekon. Soon, Erdogan turned his conspiracy-ridden eyes toward his erstwhile political ally Gulen and his followers known as Gulenists.

After the 2007 presidential election, Erdogan and his ally Gulen charged that Ergenekon plotters were planning to overthrow the government in an operation code named Sledgehammer. Over 300 military officers were rounded up and charged with treason. The Sledgehammer computer documents were dated 2003, but they were written in Word 2007. Although it was clear that the documents were forgeries, likely written by Erdogan’s supporters, the Erdogan government began accumulating more undemocratic power. In a few years, the relationship between Erdogan and Gulen began to fracture.

By 2013, the alliance between Erdogan and Gulen ended. Gulen withdrew his support from Erdogan. The Turkish prime minister responded by purging his government, including Cabinet ministers. Erdogan accused them of being Gulenists and of being members of a «parallel government». Arrests of «secret government» operatives increased. Erdogan, totally suffering from delusional paranoia, was instituting the same type of «deep state» he believed was a threat to him.

It is clear that the July 15 attempted coup by a small sector of the Turkish military was directed by members of Erdogan’s own «deep state,» which can be called «Ergenekon II». The coup attempt, which made every possible mistake by design, had several goals. The first was that Erdogan was able to flush out his remaining opponents in the military by waiting to see who rallied to the side of the coup plotters. Second, Erdogan used the coup attempt to seize even more power by, among other things, firing over 2700 judges across Turkey. Third, in urging his supporters to go to the streets, Erdogan was able to reinvigorate flagging support for his AKP agenda. Imams exhorted Turks to rally to Erdogan’s side in messages amplified by speakers atop mosque minarets across Turkey, the orders having come from Turkey’s Religious Affairs Directorate, a cipher for Sunni radicalism.

The July 15 coup was doomed to fail, by Erdogan’s own hand. Although the coup began as a classic military overthrow of a civilian government, with strategic points – the two cross-Bosporus bridges, Istanbul’s international airport, the state broadcast network TRT, and the General Staff headquarters in Ankara – all being taken by the coup leaders, it was engineered to fail and give Erdogan a needed boost in popular support.

It also remains a mystery how the coup plotters, who strangely limited their actions to seizing a few, but not all strategic centers, could, at the same time, manage to shut down most social media in Turkey, including Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube. And there is the nagging issue of why the coup plotters did not move to arrest Erdogan at his holiday location on the Aegean Sea. In fact, after Erdogan left his seaside holiday hotel in Marmaris, his plane was reportedly refused landing at Istanbul’s Ataturk International Airport, which was reported to be in rebel hands. Erdogan’s propaganda operation then began to put out false information that Erdogan, who was in the air on his presidential plane, was seeking asylum in Germany. The truth is that Erdogan’s plane never strayed far from Turkish airspace. Although major social media was shut down, Erdogan appeared on FaceTime from his iPhone on CNN Turk, which had not yet been seized by the rebel military forces.

If the coup had been a serious attempt at changing the government, FaceTime would have also been shut down. CNN Turk, the affiliate of the American Cable News Network (CNN), would have been taken off the air immediately, as was the TRT state broadcaster. Also, the state-run Anadolu news agency continued to issue statements from Prime Minister Binali Yildirim claiming that the coup had been put down just after it started. An actual coup would have seen the news agency also shut down.

After Erdogan supporters took over Ataturk International Airport, Erdogan landed at the domestic terminal during the early morning hours of July 16 to be met by cheering crowds. These diehard supporters of Erdogan had been with him since his days as mayor of Istanbul. Erdogan’s plane landed without incident. In an actual coup, Erdogan’s plane would have been surrounded by the military and he would have been placed under arrest. Or, if the presidential plane insisted on landing against the military’s orders, it would have been shot down.

Generating even more sympathy for himself, Erdogan claimed that his hotel in Marmaris was bombed after he left after learning of the coup. It would also be in Erdogan’s interest to order the bombing of the hotel, as well as his massive presidential palace in Ankara, as a way to garner even greater popular sympathy and support.

The coup «plotters» also chose to strike at a time when massive traffic jams would result from highway closures in Istanbul, a sprawling metropolis of 15 million people. By closing all lanes on the cross-Bosporus bridges and not keeping one lane open so people could get home from work, the population grew angry at the «coup» and the alleged «leaders».

If the coup attempt had been an actual one, Erdogan would have been arrested and jailed with no possibility of broadcasting a message to the Turkish people. The Turks, more than anyone, know about the collapse of the Greek Cypriot coup against Cypriot President Archbishop Makarios in 1974. After a Greek Cypriot junta announced that Makarios was ousted and was killed during the coup, Makarios turned up speaking to the nation from a low-wattage radio station in Paphos, Cyprus. Makarios announced that the coup leaders would never rule Cyprus. The coup failed. The Turkish military is well-aware of this history because they used the attempted Greek Cypriot coup to invade and occupy northern Cyprus, ostensibly to protect the Turkish Cypriot population.

Erdogan was also met at the airport by a crowd waving brand new Turkish flags, the folds still visible. This is always a sign of George Soros’s involvement in themed revolutions, with protesters always waving factory-fresh flags. Some Erdogan supporters were also seen waving brand new flags representing the Muslim separatist group of East Turkestan in western China, a group supported by Soros. Soros’s Open Society Institute operates freely in Istanbul and Soros is on friendly terms with Erdogan. It is also noteworthy that US Secretary of State John Kerry, a Soros acolyte, indicated he would recommend extraditing Gulen from exile in Pennsylvania if it was determined that the cleric was behind the coup. Erdogan could not have asked for any more support for his false flag coup, which had two major goals: ramming through a new Constitution for Turkey that will give Erdogan near-dictatorial powers and grabbing Gulen and putting him in prison or worse. Kerry’s statements were as inane as has been Barack Obama’s constant use of Erdogan as a consultant on Middle East and Islamic issues. Obama could do no worse by seeking the advice of the head caliph of the Islamic State.

The coup attempt in Turkey was a combination of the Nazi-orchestrated Reichstag fire in Germany in 1933, an event blamed on Communists in order for Adolf Hitler to scrap the German Constitution, and Operation Valkyrie, the military plot to kill Hitler at his East Prussian lair in 1944. By waiting long enough to see who joined the false flag coup in Turkey, Erdogan borrowed a page from Hitler, who waited to address the German nation until all the supporters of Valkyrie made themselves known. It was then that Hitler ordered the arrests and executions of the coup plotters. After the collapse of the Turkish coup, Erdogan immediately moved to arrest actual and suspected coup plotters who had been caught in a classic «fly paper» operation.

Erdogan fancies himself as a modern-day Ottoman sultan. He now sees himself as a besieged leader. Erdogan is more dangerous than ever and Turkey is in store for a very bleak future, indeed.

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